Cheeks are the new breasts
Now that I’ve got your attention—
Have you noticed the latest fashion in cheeks? Now I know there didn’t used to even be fashions in cheeks, but with the ubiquity of cosmetic surgery that wonderful day has come to pass.
Why do I compare the new cheeks to breasts? Because breasts also used to be a natural thing, and if a woman was relatively well-endowed or not it was pretty much genes (or, at the very most, the temporary fix of a padded bra) that were responsible. With the advent of breast implants not only did that change, but the very nature of the desirable breast shape became different, especially for the young and those who pay attention to these things.
Models and movie stars are the traiblazers, and as we gaze on them more over time the new unnatural becomes the familiar and then the standard. For example, is there an unaltered breast in the entire Victoria’s Secret catalogue? I can’t say I know; but I suspect not, because the combination of very slender body and very full breasts exists only rarely in nature, and breasts that are the shape of grapefruits or tennis balls not at all. But these have become the thing to emulate now, and whole websites are devoted to showing young women what natural breasts look like, because so many of them fear that their own unenhanced ones are abnormal.
Now the cheek has followed suit. Cheek implants and fillers were originally designed to offset the ravages of age, when the cheeks can lose subcutaneous fat and droop. But now even the young have them, especially if in the public eye, and the additions are so noticeable and generally odd-looking that they give their bearers an alien yet almost-familial resemblance to each other. They are intended to “simulate the look of high cheekbones,” but it ain’t necessarily so.
I suppose this post should be illustrated with a ton of photos. But it makes me too sad to start searching for examples of what I’m talking about, especially in the young, so this example will have to suffice:
The lady above is now thirty-nine years old. I suppose that’s a dangerous age for women who fear the ravages of time. I barely remember it, it seems so young to me now. But I do know that, young or old, the faces I see in Hollywood are becoming more ghastly and otherworldly, with a fierce bright sharpness and definition that partakes more and more of the cartoon as opposed to the human.
Simply put, it creeps me out.
Which made me think of this, even though cheek implants have nothing to do with it:
Now it can be truly said that:
“The Colonels lady and Rosy O’Grady
Are sisters under the skin.”
I think the “before” shot looks a lot better than the “after.” As far as plastic surgery has come, it still tends to result in faces that just don’t quite look right. And the distortions it produces tend to be rather easily recognizable as being the result of plastic surgery, which for me at least invites a lot of unappealing inferences about the psychological makeup of the person whose face I’m looking at.
As for boob jobs, it’s sort of a turn off for me to realize I’m looking at the product of a surgical procedure rather than something nature produced. And, again, it tends to be fairly obvious that way.
A pet peeve of mine is upper lip pumping…where the middle is sorta untouched but the sides are full…a la Michelle Pfieffer. I *like* the look on her because I *think* on her, it’s natural.
But who knows….maybe not.
oops…make that “Michelle Pfeiffer”. I studied German enough to know better than “Pfieffer”.
Ew. That’s not terrifying, but it’s… offputting.
“Before looks pretty”. “After” looks like she’s squirreling away nuts.
Exactly!
The contrast with the amazing Gloria Swanson could never be clearer.
Sure, she was very well preserved – a lifelong vegetarian, if I recall – but the face is real, and expressive. She’s not hiding whatever aging there was. And she’s still compelling. No plastic there.
Simply put, it creeps me out.
Ditto. One of my grandmother had full cheeks, but she didn’t go to the surgeon for them.
One of my cousins inherited our grandmother’s full cheeks. During one college summer my cousin worked at Crater Lake in Oregon. One of the visitors asked my cousin, seeing her full cheeks, if my cousin had any Indian blood. My cousin, never one to forgo an opportunity for a joke, replied that she was the great granddaughter Cochise. [My cousin and I do have a trace of Indian ancestry, but it is from our not- full-cheeked grandfather.]
Would Obamacare pay for plastic surgery?
That would be “replied that she was the great granddaughter OF Cochise. “
When I saw the title I automatically assumed you were talking about the other kind of cheeks which can definitely be the new breasts as far as I am concerned. 😉
This leads me to wonder is there anything about a given woman that is actually natural?
Fake nails, hair, hair color, eye color, boobs, cheeks, botox, ugh.
The funny part is that with enough improvement in computer graphics actors and actresses will become obsolete, their outrageous salaries, antics, and plastic surgeries a thing of the past.
Why bother with an expensive, mentally unstable brat, when some malodorous geek can dial up “stars” at his workstation?
Parker: yes, I was aiming for the double entendre in the title.
Conrad: I think the “before” and “after” shots must also represent the passage of a number of years, maybe ten or so. But the lady is only 39 now, and I can’t help but think the surgery has helped age her. She also looks too thin, which can do it as well.
That, and the weight of those false eyelashes (/cattiness).
I R A Darth Aggie Says:
“This leads me to wonder is there anything about a given woman that is actually natural?”
That’s why if I ever go on a dating site I’m thinking of putting “All manufacturer parts.” It’ll be fair warning to those who are hoping for enhancements and hopefully there are still guys who like, or at least can tolerate, nature’s effects.
Nancy Pelosi is the end product unless one wants to die young. Yuck.
This triggers the same reaction as the thinness of supermodels – do these women ever actually ask men (normal men) what they think/like? Or do they not care, and just do this for themselves and/or other women?
Caucasian nose, Asian cheeks, spanish tan, with a Brazilian wax… affectation and feeling replace reality and need to be reinforced by artificiality
Why bother with an expensive, mentally unstable brat, when some malodorous geek can dial up “stars” at his workstation?
because the following is where the money is, not the movie… not to mention the leading the good down the negative road when young versions ‘turn’ and become bad examples to emulate…
big money is in endorsements and so on…
the whole fish in a net following thing is it..
they appear behind the red rope in clubs and things to be seen, but also, for their followers to get close and so on….
images alone wont have a cult of personality that one can mine for lucre
Occam’s Beard: I think most of these people live in a bubble where everyone aspires to look like that and many do, and I think the men with whom they tend to interact have bought into it as well (in Hollywood, I mean). Then there are non-celebrities who emulate them because they’re celebrities. I have no idea what the men in their lives think.
However, I’ve always been a bit amused by men who profess to like the natural look—meaning no-makeup and no artifice at all, not just the lack of plastic surgery. Very few women can pull that one off, especially after the age of 30. I’ve known many men who don’t really notice subtle, tasteful makeup as makeup at all. I think what most of them mean (unless they’re Amish or something like that) is that they don’t like a really made-up look that’s artificial.
I remember the natural look of that Mormon sect (think it was Texas) where the state came and took their children and started a court battle.
I think you can get used to any look, but I did find it hard not to stare at the unibrow of some of those young women doing news interviews.
Neo, makeup is one thing, and I (modestly speaking for all men on earth) am good with that.
I was referring to the Dachau thin look, with the two half cantaloupes implausibly affixed to the anorexic chest, pouting lips seen only on catfish (or on boxers after a title match), and an appearance that arises naturally only when one sticks one’s head out of a vehicle moving at high speed. Nothing to do with makeup.
The love and ‘hot babe’ of my life is 61. Yes, her body has changed over the decades (as have I to a lesser extent). Yet, she remains beautiful and sexy to me. Flesh may sag and soften over time but the inner beauty shines through ever more brightly as the years go by.
As we grow ever older we should realize the importance of love as the attractor, not the flesh. Given a choice between a 20 something Play Boy centerfold or my wife I would laugh at the idea that anyone was more suited to my pleasure than my 61 year old dream girl that I have snuggled up to each and every night for the last 42 years.
Occam –
“the Dachau thin look”…
whew 🙂 That’s a keeper. Made my day.
Parker, you sweetheart, you are a “keeper.”
As far as the before and after pics, I couldn’t get past the spider eyelashes. Ewww…
The desperation behind such facial alteration is sad. Sadder still is that women such as that one actually believe appearing obviously surgically altered is an improvement.
Of course, the entertainment industry always has been a haven for the emotionally fragile and insecure…
Clown faces freak some people out. What freaks me out is the way some women paint on their eyebrows with a unnaturally curved upward, almost sneering, arch. Michelle Obama has these eyebrows.
I don’t like blondes, so I’m not thrilled by either picture.
I do like fake breasts, trout lips and high cheeks, but I also abhor brazilian butts, feather duster eyelashes and never really liked makeup.
While there are some basic ideas of sexual attractiveness, we all have our own particular favorites. The women that are doing this are doing it because it either:
a. Makes them feel good
b. They want to appeal to what they think is attractive
c. They are in a business in which this manipulation is necessary for them to stand out from the herd
That last point is important because these “stars” are doing things that we should consider professional in nature. Just like massive amounts of makeup are necessary for TV and Film, so is a prominent face important for some productions. I don’t think the lady in the picture (whose name I do not know) cares what we think about her as long as she can still get a paycheck.
I didn’t realize cheek implants were an option, but that explained the oddly contorted faces of the majority of Real Housewives of ______ (insert Beverly Hills, Orange County, etc.)
This post of yours, neoneocon, sprung a memory for me of a screening session of a Lifetime Movie I helped produce in ’06. It was SOP scantily clad bikini chicklets in jeopardy on(Puerto Rico location)deserted island. The more jeopardy, the more jiggle. Anyway, with my little band of techie-edit,etc ‘Yoots in the screening room, I pointed at the one old school, real & abundant boobage on 1 of the 4 chicklets and said,”Kids, that’s what Boobs used to look like!!” They had not seen any REAL equipment on the screen before. (-:
Hey, I’m a teacher.
Oh, Great… another mutilation of the female body that NOW will blame on men
I only noticed last year that Mary Pickford, who also withdrew into an old Spanish style house and a bottle, has the same number of syllables in her name as Norma Desmond. I suppose everyone else got in back in 1950, but I was not born until November of that year, and I had a cold soon thereafter.